


nobody tells you this

by f_vikus



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Infidelity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-23
Updated: 2013-11-23
Packaged: 2018-01-02 11:06:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1056031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/f_vikus/pseuds/f_vikus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's never easy being the undefined half of the relationship.  If there was a relationship to begin with.  Academy-verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	nobody tells you this

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this line from [](http://creedfic.livejournal.com/profile)[**creedfic**](http://creedfic.livejournal.com/) 's [Interwoven](http://creedfic.livejournal.com/48361.html#cutid1) "It hurts you when he cheats."  Brilliant fic.  Go read it. 

 

 

  
McCoy’s not stupid, nor is he blind. He knows what the other cadets think of him, of how’s he’s some cranky asshole doctor. Most of the cadets are terrified of him, and give him wide berth, and sometimes quite literally, like when he walks to his room, or when he lines up for food. He merely ignores them, loudly commenting on their irrational fears in his head. The cadets, _his colleagues_ – he reminds himself, that he works with are a little more understanding. But it doesn’t stop them from contributing to the rumour pool. And every time McCoy catches wind of the rumours, it doesn’t stop his heart from aching a little bit more, a knot appearing in his stomach.

He thinks now that it was only time before Jim turned his sights on him. There was no alcohol involved; they both went in with their eyes wide open, Jim grinning all the while, running slightly calloused hands down his sides and slipping under his shirt to touch him. Jim’s eyes were blue, two twin points in the dim of the room, eyes focussed solely on him, McCoy under him, twisting to reach up for Jim, for more of his skin and his touch and –

McCoy had woken with Jim pressed up against his back, tucked around his body, with his chin in his head and his nose in his hair. Jim’s arms, one slung haphazardly across his hip, the other under McCoy’s neck, held McCoy close.

_Oh_ , McCoy had thought. Jim snuffled and moved himself even closer.

_Okay_ , McCoy had thought. Because it was. Encircled in the warmth of Jim’s arms, McCoy had felt something inside him loosen, something that had been wound up tight and hidden behind layers of sarcasm and gruff and bitterness.

What he wasn’t okay with was the _after_ part, where Jim went out and came back reeking different. He’s male too; he understands the curiosity of other people, of discovering whether or not that girl with the bright laughter would sound any different in bed, whether or not that quiet redhead was actually a redhead. Jim doesn’t blindside him as much as he thought it would, but it doesn’t hurt any less, the realization of not being enough settling in much too quickly and comfortably for his liking.

Jim’s laughter is no less bright in bed. If anything, it’s clearer, lighter, without the weight of the Kirk name bearing down on his shoulders.

McCoy bears on, because that’s all he knows.

 

\--

 

“ – caught them both in the lab! And he just stops and smirks.”

 

McCoy stops in the hall. He knows exactly who they’re talking about, and he heaves a sigh. He’d have to bring Jim another hypospray of broad spectrum antivirals just in case.

“You can’t be serious. That’s disgusting.”

_Yeah_ , McCoy thinks grimly. _It sorta fucking is_. He hoists his bag higher up on his shoulders and starts down the hall again.

“That’s what I heard. I don’t know why McCoy even sticks around with him. It’s like the poor guy doesn’t even know about, you know.”

They sigh.

And that’s new.

He’s never been a subject in any gossip, no matter how blatantly true or grossly inaccurate. Most of the other students leave him alone, due to his apparent age, or to his business-like demeanour, or his refusal to participate in what he considers petty schoolyard behaviour. He’s not trying to be arrogant. He’s not. But this is his second time around in school, and he’s squandered away his right to juvenile irresponsibility.

Then they’re turning the corner, and there’s nowhere for McCoy to go, except right into their line of sight. They break off their conversation the moment they see him, but it’s clear that they know that’s he’s heard them, by the way they both look at him with wide expressions.

They stare at each other, both stunned at this inadvertent confrontation. The girls’ expressions are morphing into twin looks of horrified. McCoy feels his face heat up. One of the girls opens her mouth. “Look, McCoy – ”

McCoy cuts her off. “You should watch the fuck you say, especially if none of your goddamn business!” he spits out, red washing across his vision. His head pounds furiously, and skin is too tight and he knows his face is red, and he can feel the other cadets’ eyes on him, alarmed at his uncharacteristic outburst. “Just, for fuck’s sake. It’s not high school, or some other shit like that anymore!” He’s shouting at her, his voice growing too loud for what would’ve been a private confrontation.

She didn’t cry. This is why she was in Starfleet, McCoy later muses, because girls like these, beautifully strong and smart girls like her did not cry when asshole men like him shouted at her in a crowded hallway. Her friend had frozen at the beginning of his verbal assault, but they both looked at him with the same, carefully constructed expression that he now identifies as pity.

McCoy closes his eyes. He does not think of Jocelyn, her lovely golden hair and smile, her slender fingers. He knows what cheating looks like, and yet. It’s not cheating, not when you’re not dating, and you haven’t talked about being exclusive because you weren’t even sure that it was an option, and he knows that asking Jim might scare him off. He’s not spineless. But he’s known, from the very moment Jim laid eyes on him, touched him, made him come, that Jim had his heart, or whatever was left of it.

“I’m sorry, McCoy,” she says carefully, and he gets the feeling that she’s apologizing for more than just talking about him, like he’s just found out now about Jim, about how nothing and no one will ever be enough for Jim because the world screws him over.

She would make a great diplomat. _Or a negotiator_ , McCoy thinks, as he pushes past the girls. He’s sorry too.

 

\--  
 

 

  
“Why do you let him do this to you?” Uhura slides her tray onto the table, and sits down, grace overflowing everywhere.

McCoy could see the appeal. Brilliant, talented, exquisitely charming, not unlike Jim, himself. McCoy could see why Jim threw himself at her all the time.

“Excuse me?” McCoy merely raises an eyebrow at her in greeting, and then resumes eating.

“Don’t pretend. Your showdown with a certain cadet was quite the show.” She moves her potatoes to the right, and the meat to the left.

McCoy shrugs, and aims for indifference instead of denial. He feels like shouting back at her _You know, it’s the same reason why you let that Vulcan near you_ , but he’s tired. He doesn’t know if any of this is even worth defending.

She tilts her head to the side, narrowing her eyes, and the light hits her perfect cheekbones, highlighting the elegant curve of her jaw, and God she’s beautiful, and so fucking smart, and **exactly** like him. He sees the proud way she carries herself, her shoulders steeled against whispers – and he’s not deaf; he’s heard it just like everybody else –of favouritism, and oh God, if he and everyone knows about her, and she’s _discreet_ , and while he and Jim weren’t shouting it from the top of Starfleet Hill, they weren’t exactly careful when they were drunk, then he was no secret at all, and those girls talking about him, they were _kind -_  

He gets up abruptly, kicking his chair backwards, and disrupting Uhura and his cup of coffee. She looks at him, confusion sliding across her face.

“Len, what – ?”

“’Scuse me,” he mutters, and takes off.

 

\--

 

 

  
He misses exactly two whole classes and a coffee date – _No,_ he corrects himself mentally, a coffee _thing_ with Jim, and spends it staring at the ceiling of his bedroom.

He’s done crying. He did all that grieving madness when Jocelyn was divorcing him, and wept like a girl in his hotel room, back pressed up into the corner until his spine protested the abuse, but the tears come anyways, sliding from the corners of his eyes down the side of his face, stinging and hot against his skin. Humiliation always got him in the end, and public humiliation was always the end bullet for him. McCoy thinks of the girls, and the side looks people shoot him, and now he can identify and categorize the looks, and everything makes sense, all at once. Envy, anger, pity, and his world swirls down to a simple point of Jim.

He swipes at his face, angry since all of this should mean nothing, but instead, it means his happiness, his dignity, and heaves himself off his bed and into the bathroom. He is washing his face, the water cold against his flushed face, when his door chimes open.

“Bones?” Jim is uncharacteristically quiet, and McCoy thinks he hears concern, but he’s not sure, of that, of anything, of Jim. He closes his eyes and breathes in.

“In here,” he rasps, and then winces at his own voice. He walks out, rubbing his eyes, trying to appear like he had just woken up.

Jim visibly brightens up at his appearance. “Where were you? I waited for you, but you didn’t show.” He puts a cup down on the table. “Brought you this.”

“Thanks.” McCoy turns, feeling stiff and drained.

“So,” Jim begins, “what’s up?” McCoy hears the opening for what it is, and deliberately shoots it down.

“I had a long shift yesterday. Didn’t catch enough sleep.” He keeps his face down, and turned slightly away from Jim, but Jim persists.

“I brought food, just in case.” He points to the takeout cartons on the table. “Thought we could eat together tonight.”

“Thanks,” McCoy repeats, and moves past Jim to his closet, but Jim puts a hand on his arm, stopping him.

“Were you crying?” Jim asks suspiciously, peering into McCoy’s face. McCoy pushes him away roughly.

“No,” he scowls, even though he knows his eyes are red, and his face aches from the effort of pushing the tears back.

Jim doesn’t say anything. He just looks at McCoy, before moving into the kitchen. “Don’t be sad, dude,” he calls back, head in his fridge. I’ll still love you when you’re old and grey.”

McCoy watches him digging through his fridge, commenting on the contents, and murmurs, “That might just be the problem.”  



End file.
